“I’m trying to get people energized, but this meeting was easy – Colorado’s already there,” Dale said after the meeting at the chamber with representatives from industry, government and education.

More than 164,000 Coloradans work in the space business – building satellites for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, planning the agency’s next trip to the moon and developing instruments to study Earth from space, according to the Colorado Space Coalition, a group composed of business, government and university interests.

Colorado is third, behind California and Florida, in space-related employment, said Elliot Pulham, president of the Colorado Springs-based Space Foundation, a nonprofit promoting space science exploration.

Several people attending the chamber meeting told Dale they worried that fewer young people are excited about space exploration and its underpinnings – science, mathematics and engineering.

Dale said NASA plans to continue its education programs, worth about $200 million annually, but will begin tracking those programs more carefully.

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